


Vicissitudes of Life

by shortlived



Category: Final Fantasy Series, Final Fantasy X
Genre: Character Study, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-03-01 03:41:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23198758
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shortlived/pseuds/shortlived
Summary: life is a collection of fortunes and misfortunes.Who you are will doom you.  (an auron-centred piece)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 25





	Vicissitudes of Life

**Author's Note:**

  * For [snarechan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/snarechan/gifts).



> Thank you for the fanfic word you've shared, which led me to speak to you and write this piece. I hope you enjoy it.

Washed in the blue of Macalania Woods, its crystals resonating to his prayer, Lord Braska performs a summoner’s sending for a solitary unsent. Gnarled tree roots weave together to create a slim pocket of space around them, too dense to allow entry to most of the fiends that lurk the wood’s twisting paths. Auron stands guarding his lord’s back regardless, his blade ready in hand.

Yet at the same time, he finds himself watching Lord Braska’s dance. Or more accurately, he searches for a glimpse in the edges of his movements for a view of the spectre, now more human from its earlier fiendish state. They kneel, head hung, shoulders hanging even heavier. Once garbed in greys and red in life, but of particular to Auron, dressed in the familiar armour of a warrior monk--a captain’s helmet. The same as he once did, not so long ago.

If Auron was a superstitious man, he would believe it a foreboding sight to see so early into their journey.

“Look, how was I supposed to know it weren’t a real person?”

With a voice as rough as sand, Jecht grumbles beside him unprompted, his protest to Auron closer to pleading than the man may like. A scoff bubbles up his throat, but Auron doesn’t look away from the sending. The unsent’s pyreflies drift like smoke past the foliage of the encroaching trees, whistling softly in their leave.

“If you didn’t feel the need to run off down every path you see,” he starts, before deciding his chastising useless. Instead: “What possessed you to come down here in the first place?”

“Bah. I thought I saw something before I spotted ‘em--”

“Something worth slowing us, I’m sure--”

“Stop naggin’ and let me finish,” Jecht huffs. “I thought they were dying so that’s why I came over. Well, guess I was close,” he tacks on under his breath. 

The last of the pyreflies disappear into the canopies, their whispers hushing as Lord Braska inclines his head to a now empty enclosure. He turns to walk back to them, and Jecht doesn’t wait, jutting out his chin as he calls:

“So what was going on with that guy? Why’d he look real? Don’t people turn into fiends around here?”

Auron bites down on his exasperation, while Lord Braska appears unfazed to the man’s increasing absurdities. “Sometimes, those with unfinished business or a strong will can stave off the injustice of their death, and appear as real as you or I. But time wears on anyone… and it can be difficult to tell friend from foe.”

He stops before them, robes sweeping as he regards where he had stood, now nothing more than a dead end. Except, no--where the spectre had been kneeling, a summoner’s staff reclines against a mound of gathered rocks, its end resting in the long grass. A blade sits near-hidden in the growth, the usual glint of metal dulled and rusted by time.

Red-handled, the weapon of a high ranked warrior monk. If he _were_ a more gullible man...

“So he went cuckoo, huh?” Jecht remarks, cutting into Auron’s thoughts, but the blunt tone he begins with softens a fraction. “Got it. Sounds like we did ‘em a favour.”

Auron quietly inhales, about to speak when Jecht continues. “Alright, we ain’t got all day. That lake’s gotta be around here somewhere. Didn’t you say something ‘bout it being cold?” Becoming boisterous, Jecht starts heading for the way out. “’Cause _I’m_ startin’ to get a sweat here!”

Lord Braska laughs lightly and follows his lead, offering, “I hope you find the lake the same” in a knowing tone. Auron follows, twisting his sword to rest its weight against his shoulder as he walks, but then--he stops. An unusual tension taking a hold of him, urging him to look back.

He doesn’t know why -- there’s no reason to be sentimental -- but he feels possessed, the air itself speaking without a voice.

_In the end, you will never protect your summoner._

A chill sweeps past his back, and Auron turns, searching with his blade out to meet some unknown foe. But there’s nothing there--no one, no more than the falling blue leaves. The sigh of the weary trees.

“Oi, Auron! What’re you doing back there?”

Auron tightens the grip on his blade, and hurries to join the pair.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_“Hey Auron, you get any more stiff, you won’t notice when you drop dead!”_

_“And what is_ **_that_ ** _supposed to mean?”_

_“It means lighten up, kick a ball! Loosen up a lil’.”_

_“Yes, I’m sure I’ll be able to, when you take no responsibility at all.”_

_“You know, alcohol was made for guys like you.”_

When he died, there was no peace; no summoner’s dance to guide him on his path.

He drifted, or so he thought, both existing and not at once; submerged in a darkness he couldn’t perceive, but knew that surrounded him. It was turbulent, like a current, pulling and pushing him to tear him apart. He had no lungs, but there was an anger threatening to suffocate him from within, a despair that was his own. 

So easily, Auron thought, he could fall into hate. So easily, he could choose to despise this world. His last days were spent listening to the cheers and cries of celebration that swept Spira following Sin’s demise, and every second of it was a reminder of what brought it to be: Lord Braska gone, Jecht a fayth. Both of them leaving behind families that would never see them again, and a Calm that would end too soon to mean anything, a suffering that would begin anew. Despite all hope. Despite all belief.

It would have been so easy to be consumed in his despair, to sink and embrace it. No one would care, no one would ever know the true them; no one would believe the truth of the Final Aeon, nor truly honour their sacrifice...

_‘Auron. Take care of my son.’_

But he had a promise worth more than any spite, and so he rose from death, waking once more.

_'I will. I give you my word.’_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


For a seven year old, there was no greater weapon than a lock on a door.

Before that, the boy’s favourite tools were to scowl with contempt or to offer a stony silence, to show his back when spoken to. In the time she lived, his mother provided a contrast: an unquestionable hospitality, a gentle warmth, and a smile too sad to reach her eyes from their very first meeting. As time made those smiles weaker, the boy’s glare burned brighter than ever, his throat opening to find a voice, small yet sharp. Tiny fists clenched tight.

He had the colour of his mother’s eyes, but it was in that passion Auron found the traces of something familiar.

“Tidus,” Auron calls from the other side of the door. Knocking has had no effect, and he senses the passing of time through the quiet that clings to the walls of the passage. He doesn’t know the true time: Zanarkand’s machina is beyond him, and never has it mattered until now. 

But he knows Jecht would never forgive him if he allowed his son to miss his own mother’s funeral, so Auron knocks again, his desperation colouring the edges of his words as he calls again. “Please, Tidus--”

 _“Go away!”_

The boy’s volume bangs back against the door, dulled as it is when it hits. Auron breathes, relieved for even a refusal than nothing at all.

“You’ll be late.” 

“I’m not going!”

“But she’s your mother!” Auron exclaims, and his exasperation returns as silence becomes Tidus’s response. He curls a fist, wishing he could jangle the door handle enough to break it open. And then what? He couldn’t force the child, and knowing Tidus -- and he didn’t, and that was the problem; guesses were all he had -- the boy would fight him even harder, run off just to dig his heels deeper into his refusal.

For a second, Auron tips his head against the door. For that second, Auron remembers Jecht. And for that second, his anger burns deep.

_Fool, I’m not the man who should be here. I’m not the father he needs. You asked for the impossible!_

Fists clenching tighter, Auron pulls back, breathing out heat from between his teeth. 

He should know better by now that he can convince no one. And so he won’t.

“If you’re willing to live with that choice, so be it. But she will be gone, and you can’t undo what’s done.”

Waves brush softly against the hull of the boat outside, the only other sound. Auron concedes to it, and retreats to the upper deck, closing the hatch behind him. Rising to the sea salt air, he spots an elderly woman waiting by the stern in soft blues, hair pulled back into a bun, posture slanted. The owner of the boat next door, Auron recognises.

“Loss is a hard thing to face, my dear,” she calls sympathetically. “Should I go in?”

With her hands perched on the head of a narrow-bodied cane, he begins to dissuade her slow approach when, from behind him, metal creaks. A small frame crawls on scrawny limbs from the re-opened hatch, a bed of tawny hair licking out.

Tidus clambers onto his feet with a bowed head, dressed in trousers that hide his usually bared knees. Without word or acknowledgement, he scurries past Auron without any acknowledgement, the old woman as well, tiny footsteps thudding along the berth until he comes to a crossroads.

The woman hums under her breath, and with a surprising pace goes to join the boy. Tidus doesn’t look up when she comes up beside him, and she places a hand on his shoulder, a means to direct him. By the time Auron comes to join him, Tidus is marching on ahead again, not waiting for either of them, arms kept stiff his pace.

In Jecht’s Zanarkand, there are no sendings for the dead--only send offs. Friends and family gather at the end of a pier, a single casket facing the ocean than the many that usually accompany funerals in Spira. They murmur parting words and touch a lid adorn with wreaths, before finally pushing it out to sea, to sink into the deep blue.

Tidus is a small trembling thing by the head of his mother’s coffin, nothing of his face to be seen where it hangs, but the sobs he fails to choke back scratching at his throat. Auron keeps his distance during the affair, or tries; but the old woman from before chides him to “not be so stupid--come, you’ve been with that family long enough” and pulls him with words alone amongst the group. He stands immobile, out of place, not knowing what to do amongst these people, this private affair, his jaw too tense to mutter any words should he want to. The thought of touching the coffin burns the ends of his fingers without him ever moving.

He can’t, when he knew all the while the truth behind her loss, and the role he didn’t play in stopping it.

Tidus doesn’t move or aid as the coffin is pushed off the pier, his mother sent to rest, until it finally tips--and then he lunges for it, stopped by the arm Auron latches around his shoulders, his grip firm despite Tidus’s kicks and screams.  
  


That night, he sleeps outside the boy’s bedroom, refusing him the opportunity for anything reckless--knowing exactly where such grief leads.

  
  
  
  


A summoner’s sacrifice is always remembered.

The hope they gave to Spira will always be honoured.

Is to die for such hope worth the honour?

Is to die for such hope worth the loss?

In a world that never changes,

what do they truly die for?

  
  
  
  
  
  


On the way to confront Sin, neither he nor Lord Braska exchanged words beyond the necessary.

Anything else, and Auron might’ve broken. Under what, he couldn’t determine--if the absence of Jecht and what he had become, lingering now in some part within Lord Braska, or the hope they clung onto that would make the sacrifices being made worth it.

Auron knew he couldn’t beg again for Lord Braska to reconsider. He thought about it constantly, the urge sticking to the back of his throat. But the loss of Jecht and knowing he could never be returned--it silenced Auron before he even began. What could he say that would change Lord Braska’s mind now? What, when Jecht had given his life believing in his strength? When they could never bring him back again?

It was too late now.

There was no other choice.

They had to believe.

Auron remembers it, and wishes he didn’t: the last stretch of his role as guardian, guiding Lord Braska to the end they were always heading towards. How the midday sky washed in the tones of a new dawn as Sin’s form was torn apart, bursting into countless pyreflies by Braska’s Final Aeon.

And how, when it was over, there was nothing left of Lord Braska to mourn. 

There was no one left but him.

  
  
  
  


_“Auron._

  
  
  
  
  


_...Thank you.”_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Hope.

Belief.

They were the most powerful of deceivers.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


“I’d say you’ve gotten quite popular, haven’t you Auron?” Kinoc jests.

Auron huffs, not removing his attention from his book; he didn’t need to look to know what Kinoc was referring to. Over by the door to his quarters where the man had just entered, recent statements of his _popularity_ had been set aside, having no place in his otherwise modestly-decorated room: a matching pair of scrolls tied with silken cord, the symbol of Yevon carved into each flat end of the polished handles; drinks boxed and stored in decorative containers, cups matching in design to go with it; leather bound volumes -- most likely of the scriptures -- in a create half his height, none of which he had bothered to glance through. But surely, they were written in a careful hand; carefully crafted as everything else that had been waiting for him to find that day when he returned from his duties.

“It’s ludicrous,” is all he can say before shutting his book, hand resting over its worn covering. He spares the collection an acknowledging glance from where he sits, distaste growing on his tongue. There was perhaps no singular item amongst all of it that wasn’t worth more than everything he owned.

“I don’t know what to do with the stuff.”

“I say drink it,” Kinoc suggests too casually, the ceramic bottle he’s picked out going _glunk_ when he gives it a slight tip, crooked with his smile. “It’s here.”

“I feel like they’re trying to win my favour,” Auron dismisses, but he doesn’t stop Kinoc from joining him with the drink at his low-seated table, taking the cushion adjacent to him. Kinoc places two ceramic cups down, glossy and engraved, glinting in the light of the lantern at the table’s centre. His cup of water casts a heavy shadow across the chipped surface in contrast, dulled and chipped.

“Is that so wrong?” Kinoc remarks, sounding unfazed. The bottle top _pops_ as it’s opened. “Yours is a good favour to have.” 

He pours generously for the both of them, then sets one of the cups closer to Auron. A sweet alcoholic smell finds his nose before he considers taking a hold of it, and if Auron had to guess, it was ale. Which bothered him more than it pleased him that the sender got so lucky with his tastes.

They drink, if with a different measure of hesitance. None of which Kinoc owned, making impressed noises, his brow raising as he observes his drink.

“These rumours must be pretty serious.”

“I seriously hope not,” Auron mutters, finally taking his sip.

 _Ugh._ Kinoc’s assessment wasn’t exaggerated.

“Ah, you wouldn’t want a wife by your side?” his friend goes on. “I hear she’s quite the looker. I know she is,” Kinoc adds after a beat, and Auron’s shoulders lift in his disapproval. He places the cup aside, a disagreeable aftertaste coating his tongue. “If you’re asked, why don’t you accept it? The proposal.”

“What?” Auron’s head shoots up, his stare incredulous. “No! I don’t even know her name!”

Kinoc raises a single eyebrow in jest.

“Is a name what you need?”

And Auron returns this with his own brow pinching, his mouth too. Kinoc eases under his disapproval, but continues thoughtfully. “If the rumours _are_ true… the two families have long been close, our commander and Priest Belnin.” 

“Kinoc, you listen to too many stories.” And everyone else had too many to make up. “Marriage is irrelevant to the second-in-command position--it’ll go to the one right for it. And that includes you as well as me,” Auron reminds him. “What place does this matter have in what we do? It’s nonsense.”

Kinoc chuckles softly, conceding with an incline of his head. He brings the decorative cup up to drink, but pauses before it reaches his lips. Quiet for a second.

“You’re right,” he submits, “but is it wrong to want to see a friend happy?” His gaze lifts, and with it his cup. “To Yevon. And the right choice.”

Auron resists the shake of his head, and takes his beaker of water to join in with the toast. There was no doubt in his mind--no matter how the gossip tried to pair the two unconnected rumour together--that reality would make far more sense than the idle fancies of bored sentry monks.

A marriage to some woman in exchange for the role as second-in-command to the warrior monks. A marriage of convenience, because of some apparent crush; tales of corruption and foolish thought that had no place under the workings of Yevon.

He believed that, and so thought of it no more--

That even when the Maester of Military Affairs himself proved otherwise, he stuck to his stubborn belief.  
  
  
  
  


He was a fool.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_“When you finally become Maester, I hope you don’t forget me at the top.”_

_“Hahaha, Kinoc!”_

_“What? You should aim for anything. After all,_

_Maester Auron…_

_Well, wouldn’t_ **_that_ ** _be fun to say?”_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Faith was the foundation that kept Spira together.

“What do you mean, you _don’t watch blitzball?_ ”

But to the residents of Zanarkand, there was no greater faith than that in one’s favourite blitzball team.

“Then...what do you _do?”_

Tidus watches him prepare lunch from the living room, his disbelief exaggerated in a way that was as ridiculous as had become understandable. The people of Spira used blitzball as a distraction; in Zanarkand, it was a way of life.

Still, Auron hadn’t heard this level of bewilderment from the boy since he had admitted to not knowing how most of the machina in the boathouse worked, to which Tidus had scoffed and decided him, under muttered breath, _weird._

“Look after you,” Auron responds. Tidus hums a dissatisfied note, stopping, then carries it further as he thinks.

“Is that why you’re always so grumpy?” he settles on.

Auron feels the corners of his mouth twitch.

“Hm. Maybe.”

“--That’s not what I mean!” Tidus finally exclaims. “I mean you don’t do anything _fun!”_

Auron allows himself a smile before leaving the kitchen, joining the boy at the table with their lunches. Tidus scrapes his plate unnecessarily, all the while working the holoview to switch its footage over to some blitzball game. With commentary already being spoken over the match, Tidus dives into a rambling of additional points on top, all the while shovelling omelette around his words.

It was an explanation -- or something of that nature -- that carried over the next couple of days, during dinner and whenever they sat together, sometimes even when not. The holoview was technically visible from the kitchen, but Auron had no intention to divide himself between cooking and Tidus’s opinions of the top current blitzball players, and made as much clear. Tidus didn’t listen.

It was a contrast from their beginnings. Tidus begrudged Auron’s presence in the boathouse after his mother’s funeral, his temper threatening to flare up at any time. His screams were as loud as his silence was unforgiving, and to the accusations Tidus threw at him--that he didn’t belong here, he shouldn’t be here, he didn’t trust him, _you’re not my dad_ \--Auron had no objections to offer.

So he gave none, and allowed the boy’s moods to cool when and as they would, for the silence to become more prominent; waiting on the boy’s rage to eat itself, until Tidus finally became resigned to the life that had been dealt to him. Until he realised how little control he really had.

Just as his fury had been familiar to Auron, so was his defeat.

But it was where their similarities ended. While Tidus lurked in the spaces of his own home closer to an anomaly than its occupant, slowly, he found outside comforts. He spent time with the neighbouring woman who would visit--in the earlier days with meals, their recipes passed over to Auron with a pat on his arm--and then with friends closer to his age not willing to give up on him. Sometimes, Tidus would ask Auron to go with him outside, to keep such unknowns who recognised him by Jecht’s fame from bothering him. They would wander to find some different view of the sea, or just as far as Tidus’s legs would decide before the boy wanted to go back home.

They would never speak, except for then--with the job of figuring where home was left to Auron.

Sometimes there would be fights, with other kids and words exchanged that Auron could only assume. Tidus never spoke about it except in his anger, its flames rekindled, telling Auron to stay out of it if he asked. Then there were the days he wouldn’t want to come out of his room, no particular source to his misery other than life itself.

But while melancholy at times dragged the boy down, there was one day Auron remembers, catching Tidus peering at him from the steps leading to the upper deck, the laundry beside him and a tub of hot water filled to wash it with.

“We have a washing machine,” he’d said, flat yet bemused, and then taken an armful of the laundry back inside to a white box in the kitchen that opened by a tiny door. The machina hummed once the rest had been deposited into it, the clear window showing colours blending into one another.

“It’ll beep once it’s done,” he finished with, and from that point, Auron became less a begrudging fixture whose existence Tidus lurked around, to someone whose name he started to use.

He showed him the basic functions of most of the machina in the boathouse, while Auron better figured how to be a caretaker for the young boy. But as his moods became less frequent and his tone less petulant, Auron put more responsibilities on the boy, ones he already knew how to do, though had grown comfortable in not. Tidus went back to school after half a year, and Auron found work from time to time to replace the savings spent, when it became evident he would have the free time, and little would ever conflict with his duties.

But there was rarely anything serious that fell the boy that wasn’t emotional or fleeting, and fiends were a rarity to behold. The city was always adequately supplied, and they were never wanting.

Without Sin, Auron sometimes thought, this is what life could be like. Without Yevon’s teachings, there would be no need to scorn such technology that helped in daily life.

He wondered if that could be true--or if he wasn’t falling for the lie of a dream.

But the answer never mattered. He would never know.  
  


“Auron!”

Joining him on the upper outer deck, a blitzball rocking under a foot failing to keep it still, Tidus smiles with a mischievous glint in his eyes. Auron regards him, and the boy says “Ready?”, but nothing more before kicking the ball towards him. He swings so it misses his shoulder, and it bounces off the ceiling behind him, bobbing once off the ground before rolling innocuously in the boy’s direction, who watches it stop at the edge of the stairs.

 _“Tidus,”_ Auron starts, the reprimand in his inflection. 

“What? I didn’t hit you!” Quick on the defence, Tidus scoops the ball into his arms, cheerful as he lifts it above his head. “Kick a ball! Loosen up a lil’!” 

And with that, he rolls it over to Auron. It lightly knocks into the framing behind him, and reluctantly--staring at where the blue and white ball stops, contemplating if he really wanted to humour the child--Auron nudges it in place.

_Why…_

_Why was he doing this..._

He questions it with a different kind of exasperation he hasn’t experienced for a time, but for his hemming and hawing (and seeing if Tidus was paying attention--which he was, unfortunately), Auron finally gives it a kick. He means it to be light, but it hits the framework adjacent to Tidus--and afraid it’ll hit him, Auron lunges half a step-forward--and flies off down to the lower deck.

Or somewhere in the water, when a _plop_ reaches their ears.

Auron feels a rush of heat crawl up his face, and he’s torn between an apology and blame. But Tidus interrupts both with a laugh, young and joyous, his brow slanting with his grin.

“You really _are_ bad at blitz!” he jokes, and then runs noisily down the steps to retrieve his ball, calling for Auron before long to help.

Except it takes Auron a moment to do, when a laugh catches in his throat inexplicably--a laugh he doesn’t understand, doesn’t want to, that hurts in its affection once it finally escapes.

  
  
  
  
  


He didn’t need to be alive to live for another.

He simply needed to exist, and that would be enough.

But at times, he was allowed to forget.

At times, he remembered who he used to be.

  
  
  
  
  


With Jecht and Lord Braska, it wasn’t the first time Auron saw the Calm Lands. Training as a warrior monk had taken him out there to use its open lands for drills, its few fiends at times extra fodder for their practices.

But when he crossed the threshold of Macalania Wood with the pair for a different purpose, the scenery was an overwhelming sight. Green plains stretched out endlessly over jutting hills, deceptively tranquil for the true purpose they were kept sparse. It was ordinary, so unassuming in appearance; and yet nowhere had made Auron pause as he did then. His shoulders rigged, tense.

He felt the need to hold his breath and to never let go, or something would surely befall them.

Mt. Gagazet loomed at the other end of the great plain as their destination, its frosty peaks hidden by mountain walls that stood as daunting as those that guarded Bevelle. Traversing the plains, Auron thought--almost, not sincerely, _but_ \--that there would be nothing beyond once they slipped through the solitary crack in the rocky barricade: that there was no Mt. Gagazet to greet them, no Zanarkand to find. No way ahead, forward, and therefore nowhere for Lord Braska to offer up his life.

It was foolish, a ridiculous fancy. But each time Auron regarded Lord Braska, searching for some sign of uncertainty in him, all he found was the man’s unbending resolve.

Could anything else stop him?

“--Heads up!”

But as for Jecht, the man had managed to find a blitzball on their descent from the woods and belted him on the head, with a throw Jecht _insists_ he warned for.

“You really are bad at blitz, ain’tcha!”

He roared boisterously, an energy that deflated later when the ball did, popped between the jaws of a fiend.

  
  
  


They camped out before the valley leading into Mt. Gagazet that night, agreeing to wait for the early morning to make the climb. The quiet was more unnerving than it had been in the day, keeping Auron company through his watch. Signs of fiends had been far and few during their trek (despite Jecht’s misfortunes), but that was no reason to become careless.

So Auron had said. But the prospect of sleep was uninviting, though staying up proved no better. He was left with nothing more than his thoughts for company, the swallowing silence; save for the crackling of the flames at the campsite murmuring in his ear while he sat in view of the valley they were to cross and the lands below.

No longer did he find himself thinking, _‘We will get rid of Sin’_ as he always had. Only, ‘ _Lord Braska will perish’, ‘Lord Braska will be gone’..._

This he had always known. So now why did he falter in belief of their path? Why now did it feel too great a cost?

A weight presses down on his shoulder.

“--You’re totally out of it, huh. Ain’t like you.”

With his heart in his throat, Auron’s staring up--and in his view is Jecht. Risen from sleep, the faintest sliver of the campfire’s light lining his frame. Auron can’t see his face from where he sits, but Jecht lowers to join him: legs spreading, arms leaning back; his shoulders stretching with each tilt of his head, as if to deal with some crick. 

Casual, comfortable as always, at least in appearance. Does he envy that quality, or detest it?

“I’m just… thinking,” Auron finally admits. Gaze cast out towards the sloping hills, the border between woods and sky; the stars dusting the night blue. “We’re nearly there. To Zanarkand.”

“Yeah. But I guess it’s Braska you’re thinking about,” Jecht remarks, voice soft; still as hoarse, harsh as always, that Auron can only observe the attempt through experience.

But he says nothing, so Jecht continues. “Mad as I was when he finally told me, I get it. If my son was here, I’d do anything to keep him safe too. And taking my wife? Stick me in those robes and I’ll go get that Final Aeon myself!”

He throws out an arm, a fist, a declaration raised with the motion. It doesn’t carry out into the lands, but it rings loudly in Auron’s ears. He spares a look to his sleeping lord, but he doesn’t appear to have moved at all.

Auron lingers on the sight of the man’s quiet form before slowly bringing himself back to the conversation. “That’s why we must defeat Sin,” he says as an agreement. “But,” and he’s careful with the words that follow, “I can’t help but wonder… how much longer summoners will have to continue to give up their lives until Sin will be gone forever.”

“...Well, hopefully, it’ll end with Braska.” A solemn weight doesn’t escape that hope, not entirely bushed aside as Jecht includes, “And if not, we can think of something together.”

“Another one of your plans, Jecht?”

“Hey, you’ve gotta admit, I’ve had some good ones.” 

Jecht earns his scoff, small and halfhearted as Auron can offer it.

“I would’ve thought you’d want to focus on finding a way back to your family.”

The man sighs at that. Each shift he takes creates a noise Auron can hear, all so he can rub a hand into his hair. “If the way I came here was through Sin, and there’s no more Sin…”

He falls silent, and unable to find a way to continue drops that line of thought with his arm into his lap.

“I won’t give up looking,” Jecht declares, “but an answer’s not gonna just jump out. And you and me?” He faces Auron, expression coated in darkness; but somehow, the red of his eyes manage to be striking, illuminating along with the decisive curl of his mouth. “We’ll make a good team, wouldn’t you say?”

And where would they be without Jecht? This man of unknown origin, yet somehow as integral to this pilgrimage as himself. No, to more than the pilgrimage--to each of them.

As brash and as reckless and as infuriating as he’s ever been, but in that moment, fondness stirs in Auron. He manages without effort a more genuine smile, a small huff of humour with the nod of his head.

“Maybe so,” Auron muses.

Jecht laughs.

They sit for a while longer on that grassy mound, until Jecht finally rises into one of his usual exaggerated stretches, offering Auron a reminder to get some sleep too. But he stands for a moment, arms folded, staring out at the Calm Lands they were to leave behind.

“Whatever happens,” he starts, words that would stick with Auron after they’re said, “the only thing I regret is never finding a way to tell my kid I love ‘im. I’m glad Braska brought me along on this.”

Understanding by its delivery that this was neither for him nor the night, Auron says nothing to Jecht’s admission. The man then turns to head back to the dimming campfire, pausing to place a hand on Auron’s shoulder one last time.

“Let’s kick some Sin tail.”

For as long as he stayed up, the conversation lulled Auron into some sense of comfort.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


And then Jecht died, along with Lord Braska.  
  


And that was that.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Thinking on _What ifs_ will never change history.

Spending your life reflecting will never change what’s done.

Anger will lunge a boy into his death, and all that will be gotten out from the act is the thought, _serves him right, what a fool._ That dead boy will blame himself, searching where it was he went wrong, where he should have acted differently, sooner; what would have made him never draw his blade in the first place, and take forever to realise that the issue was never in the path taken, but in the one taking it. 

Because that boy was who he was, he would have never made a difference.

So after the anger, Auron found compromise; in compromising, he fell into apathy; and in his apathy, he found acceptance. A dead man can never rewrite the past, but he can accept where his life--and death--have led him, and face what’s become his reality.

His reality was far from the shores of Spira, in a city of dreams: watching over an orphaned boy who suffered from no fault of his own, but so was the way many stories went. He witnessed as this boy removed all reminders of his parents from view and hid them away, changing over the channels at any mention of _the late Jecht;_ and when he would shrink at the attention of strangers, defensive to what they might say or imply.

He wasn’t meant to pay attention when that boy practised with the ball, insecure in a way his father never was. He wasn’t allowed to hover too close--this boy didn’t need anyone, he was fine by himself, he’s lived here longer than the man anyway--but this never stopped the boy from always checking he was near, never fully trusting he wouldn’t disappear.

Then he noticed as the channel lingered longer on stories to do with his late father, if with a frown, depending on his mood; when that boy stopped caring if Auron saw what he did, but cared more that he was around at all; because this boy was 12, 13, 14 years old now, he can take care of himself, he can go out on his own--but wait, why does that mean he can do the shopping, that he should do more chores? What if he wants to go out with friends? What if he has blitzball practice? And Auron watched as he dyed his hair, glowed in the attention of strangers and declared himself older, better, over his childish tendencies, while slowly replacing the mementos of his parents back into the living room, and started humming the same tune his father always would, gazing out at the sea where he supposed his lost family to be.

And Auron allowed him to, to grow and make mistakes and to do as he pleased--knowing that boy would never lead a life that would have him looking back on himself on a blade and think, _what a fool._

_Serves him right._

And nor would Auron waste his time doing the same.

His changes were fleeting, and his time for true change gone.

  
  


  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_“Hm. You’ve changed.”_

_“Huh?”_

_“You’ve grown up.”_

_“Uh, yeah, ‘course I have. I’m fifteen!”_

_“More than that.”_

_“Geez, are you getting sappy, Auron?_

_I don’t need you telling me that. I’m getting ready to move up in life!_

_Soon I’ll be the one taking care of you, you know.”_

_“Is that so.”_

_“Er, you know…_

_A really really long time from now.”_

_“Hn.”_

_“Hey, don’t get grumpy about it!”_

  
  
  


“Auron.” 

Lord Braska greets him when he enters the temple chambers, back from his supply run for tomorrow’s trip. The ship would return to Kilika early, and with Besaid’s fayth answering his lord’s prayers, none of them, not even Jecht, saw reason to linger any longer than necessary.

“You must have missed each other,” Lord Braska speaks of the man as Auron sits, pouring for him some tea. “Jecht went to get some fresh air. I imagine he did not stray far from the temple. With the hymn and the stars, the view from the rooftop might be to his liking… Please, Auron, I joke. Sit.”

Auron does, bowing his head in shame. But Lord Braska simply chuckles, and they drink in the peace of the temple. From the chambers deep below, they can hear the singing of the fayth under them: the last that they would until they reached Zanarkand. Until they reached the end of Lord Braska’s pilgrimage.

“Jecht plans to go with us beyond Zanarkand,” Auron says out loud, as his thoughts drift upon that trip.

“Yes,” Lord Braska replies. “I had hoped truly his Zanarkand and ours would be the same, but…”

“What he’s said about his Zanarkand doesn’t make sense,” Auron admits. Despite their hopes, the more they learnt about Jecht made that clear. “I wonder how he can find his way back…”

“Are you concerned for him?” Auron looks to Lord Braska, who regards him in soft amusement. “I’m sure he would be displeased to hear us worrying about him.”

“Still,” Auron insists. Lord Braska smiles, nodding his head in understanding. He takes a drink from his cup, and Auron does the same.

“Both Jecht and yourself -- you have changed on this trip.” 

It’s a reflection shared after a moment, but no less does Auron’s eyes raise curiously to the statement. “My lord?”

Lord Braska lifts a hand flat to stifle his thoughts. “That’s no criticism,” he explains. “I’m glad. You have a full life ahead of you. Whatever you do… I hope you find yourself successful.” 

Auron lowers his drink, its warmth now only present in his palms, the back of his throat. His future, their futures...inklings of possibilities have tossed themselves around in his mind, but where they would lead, he couldn’t see. Not without first reaching Zanarkand.

That was still their ultimate goal, and nothing else mattered beyond it. All else was trivial next to helping Lord Braska defeat Sin.

“I will make sure your daughter settles here, first,” he ensures, not wishing to disregard the sentiments entirely. It’s enough for Lord Braska, who accepts it with a warmer mouth than any drink.

“Thank you.”

  
  
  
  
  
  


But any fool can change, and die the next day.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


_“My lord, what about you? Have you changed?”_

_“Have I? Do you believe so?”_

_“Ah…_

_You’ve become more focused.”_

_“Yes…_

_I always knew where I would go, but the closer we get, I become more sure of my path.”_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


In the end, you can never save your summoner.

Only your summoner can save themselves.

And only you can do the same for yourself.

  
  
  
  
  


  
  
  
  
  
  


_“You’ve changed too you know, Auron.”_

_“Have I.”_

_“Yeah. You say less to sound cool.”_

_“Hm.”_

_“Haha, see?_

_And…_

_Well..._

_I guess you’re more relaxed these days.”_

_“I guess I am._

_I ‘loosened up’, as you always insisted.”_

_“Hah! Dunno ‘bout that!_  
  


_..._

_Hey. You happy?”_

_“Happy?”_

_“You know, it’s a feeling people experience…”_

_“Hm._

_That question is…_

_...sappy, isn’t it?”_

_“Hey!_

_Eesh. Fine, forget I asked.”_

_“As you wish.”_

_“Whatever!”_

_“Hahaha...”_

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


Life is a collection of fortunes and misfortunes.

  
  


And in the end, it goes on.


End file.
